Social Web

Republican Brand Is in Terrible Shape

The favorable rating of the Republican Party is near record lows, according to the latest NBC/WSJ poll. From NBC First Read:

They public has MUCH LESS confidence in the opposition party. According to the poll, 49% hold a negative view of the Republican Party — its highest negative rating in the survey since 2008. (In fact, it’s been higher than 49% just once in the entire history of the NBC/WSJ poll.) Only 26% have a positive view of the GOP. By comparison, the Democratic Party has a net positive rating, with 44% holding a favorable view of the party and 38% holding an unfavorable one. And the conservative Tea Party movement, which took off in Obama’s first year as president, also finds its popularity at an all-time low in the poll, with an upside-down fav/unfav of 23%/47%.

What is remarkable is that even with these terrible numbers the GOP is still favored to retain control of the House in 2014 because redistricting has given them such a huge built-in advantage. In the last election Congressional Democrats got a million more votes than Republicans yet the GOP still won 30 more seats. It would take Democrats winning an almost historically large share of the popular vote in 2014 just to take a thin majority in the House

That said, the Republican Party’s rating is now so bad it is at least a possibility. There seems to be some acknowledgement among Republicans that there is a a real need to make themselves less unpopular, which could translate into slightly less aggressive stances in coming fights. The Republican Party doesn’t even need a positive favorable rating to retain control of the House, just do better than historically bad.